Selamat Petang and helloooo from a secret location! The time has arriiived sweet Survivor lovers. I've spent the last two days in a flurry of travelling and activity and I'm all ready and waiting for my trip to the islands that both the Survivors and Survivor crew are on. I'm currently in a place that I'm not allowed to disclose so as not to reveal spoilers about where the Survivors are etc.
I've signed so many confidentiality things that involve death by flogging that I don't actually know if I'll ever talk again.
Not. For now though I can't reveal anything - all I can say is that it's unbelievably boiling, pouring with rain in between and the goss I've heard from the island is that the Survivors are defs starving.
I arrived here on Sunday night after a six hour drive from Kuala Lampur which I was nostalgic to say goodbye to - despite the King standing us up on Saturday night.
The situation was that he was supposed to be the guest of honour at a flashy shindig we went to called the Colours Of Malaysia which is part of celebrations happening this year to mark Malaysia's 50 years of independence from the British.
A bunch of journo's and travel agent types from across the world (approx. 800 people in total) came together to see it live - it was broadcast on TV - and it all started with each country being introduced. When they called out South Africa our group jumped up and beserkly whooped more loudly than anyone else - except for the Brits but only 'cos there were so many millions of them.
The bash took place in Putra Jaya - the admin capital of Malaysia where all the government buildings are. The stage for the show was the outside of the Court of Justice which is the most important court in the country i.e.when all else fails in other courts the building makes the final decisions type thing.
The building as we arrived:
The king was supposed to arrive at 20h40 and we were expecting that everyone would stand in lines while he walked past greeting us - shaking hands with different people amongst us along the way but he didn't show up and didn't even bother sending an apology!
As you can imagine I was super-unimpressed considering I'd gone to all trouble of doing my make-up for him specifically. This was the result - (it took just over 40 minutes to do, it's two layers of shadow - one matte and one shiny):
If you ask me the king missed out by not meeting us bigtime and needs to get real, starting with changing his name. This is what it currently is:
His Majesty The Yang Di-Pertuan Agong XIII Al-Watgiqu Billah Tuanku Mizan Zainal Abidin Ibni Al-Marhum Al-Muktafi Billah Shah.
Ha! We all had an excellent chuckle trying to work out what his family and friends call him. My guess The Yang.
Instead of the King we got the Prime Minister doing some yawny speach I couldn't understand - I don't 'do' politicians in any shape or form so I spent the entire time rolling my eyeshow in my sockets.
Once his speech was over things picked up in a big way though and the show that followed was awesome. It was a light, sound, dance and fireworks show that featured dancers performing spectacular routines of dances from all the different nationalities who live in Malaysia.
There were hundreds of dancers in millions of extravagent costumes and each one of them was brilliant. With these sorts of things there's usually a couple of dancers among them who are crap but there wasn't one who was.
It was all so tightly rehearsed and creatively put together and each piece of music was earmerising. The mood in the crowd was the bomb too - we had these cool clapper things so we could clap and drum to the music and we all kept it going throughout the performances which united everyone happily.
The thing that blew my hair most though was the light and slide show that used the building as a backdrop. Each scene had a different backdrop that was projected onto the building in wowser colours and proportions.
I don't know how they did it but it was the best slide show I've ever seen - even the dome had a special design projected onto it as a highlight to each scene.
The show ended with a superb fireworks display that was moving in the way fireworks can be. I don't know what it is about them but they always make me bawl - on the first bang the tears just somehow plop out for no reason.
The fireworks exploded from everywhere including the sides of the building and went on for 20 minutes, lighting up the sky as if it were daylight. I tried to get pics that captured them but it was tricky getting the lighting right - hopefully they'll give you some idea as to what they felt like.
Once they were over every dancer came out to dancingly say goodbye and we all vibed out to go back to Kuala Lampur wildly swinging Malaysian flags.
And that was it! My final city adventure before leaving for where I am now. It's currently the early hours of Tuesday morning, I'm leaving for the set of Survivor at the crack of dawn on Wednesday and I'll be there for two days - then I'll be zapping on home in the early hours of Friday morning.
I won't be connected or in touch over this time - just know that I'll be thinking of you every step of the way with my eyes and ears on stalks!